Gender mainstreaming paradigm in the context of Indian marine fisheries sector: elucidation of success cases

The article explores the selected case studies pertaining to the paradigm of gender mainstreaming in Indian marine fisheries sector focusing attention on the gender equity and equality. Gender empowerment paradigm has been explored with emphasis on three pillars such as economic empowerment, well- being and decision making. The mariculture potential of India is vast as there is great scope for developing farming of shrimps, pearl oysters, mussels, crabs, lobsters, sea bass, groupers, mullets, milkfish, rabbit fish, sea cucumber, ornamental fishes, seaweeds etc. Although about 1.2 million ha is suitable for land based saline aquaculture in India, currently only 13 % is utilized. The mariculture technologies conspicuously being disseminated by Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute (CMFRI) with involvement of women and those possessing potential for women’s participation include mussel farming, edible oyster farming, pearl oyster farming and pearl production, clam culture, lobster farming and fattening, crab farming / fattening, sea cucumber culture, marine finfish culture, ornamental fish culture, seaweed culture, open sea cage farming etc. The paper highlights six case studies on gender empowerment of weaker sections in marine fisheries sector based on the practical experience of the scientists in the marine fisheries sector which comprised case studies on women’s Self Help Groups in Malabar Fisheries Sector, bivalve farming Self Help Groups of women in Kollam and Kasargod of Kerala, mussel farming Self Help Groups in Karwar of Karnataka, Institution-Village-Linkage Programme (IVLP) for Technology Assessment and Refinement, dry fish processing of women’s Self Help Group and a fisher family’s success story on crab fattening. The paper also highlights the gender issues and challenges in mariculture and marine fisheries sector in India. To ensure rapid economic development, removal of gender imbalances should be established as a priority. This would mobilize the remaining fifty percent of the country’s human resources and would result in the smooth movement of the economic wheel. Integrating gender perspective in mariculture research and technology development is inevitable because the gender mainstreaming approach advances gender equality and equity in the society. As equity is a means and equality is a result, there is a genuine need for integrating gender perspective in development works or in mariculture extension also because women are the important stakeholders of our development process and our Extension system hardly targets the women folk for technological empowerment. These case studies can be used as case models and practical manual for promoting action and group empowerment in mobilizing SHGs in any key areas on a sustainable basis